A Cloud on the Horizon

Yesterday I went walking up the local mountains with one of my African friends. It was a gorgeous day – sunny but cool enough to make it very comfortable for walking up fairly steep slopes.

We walked through small townships, past local churches, through banana plantations, maize and corn-fields. I really enjoyed the serenity of the countryside, meeting local children who nearly died with the excitement of seeing a Mzungu in their area. Once again I was a celebrity.

Then, in the midst of all this beauty we passed a small plot of land which belongs to this friend of mine. As they have not yet built on it, a poor family lives there rent-free. We ducked our heads in to see the family. However only the three children were there playing in the small garden. Aged around 18 months, three (3) and five (5) though possibly younger) the three children were on their own, totally unsupervised. The two younger children wore only t-shirts, which were both dirty and very old. The eldest child was the spokeperson for all three. She told us their mother was at work (their father is AWOL) and that the middle child had malaria. I took the youngest one in my arms and she immediately clung to me, clasping her arms firmly around my neck.

As I looked at where they lived (in a tiny wooden shack, around 2 metres in depth by around 5 metres in length) with this tiny piece of garden, unsupervised, covered in mud, sick and unclothed, I felt so helpless and powerless. Where and how do you start to help people like this? I sat with these children for a while – the baby clung to me the entire time. I looked at the washing on the make-shift line in the garden – the clothes were all so old that washing them couldn’t have done much use. And yet this mother is probably doing her best – going to work to support her family, washing the clothes so they have something to wear. And as the rain beat down last night, I thought of these children and their mother in a tiny shack with no electricity and probably very few blankets – no child should live like that.

If I thought it would have helped things or if I could have done so legitimately, I would have happily taken those children. But as little as she can give them, I’m sure their mother loves them and is doing her best. It just seems so unfair because it’s just so much less than any child deserves.

I don’t know why I’m writing about this. I guess it just disturbed me. I’ll try to help them. Not because I think they’re unique because there are hundreds and thousands of others like them in Africa, but because I can and I feel compelled to. And maybe the clothes or mosquito net I give them will be sold by the mother. I just hope it’s to feed her children and not a habit.

I’m not sorry that it’s a sad tale today but I’m very sorry that it’s true. And it's just the tip of the very big, proverbial iceberg that is Africa.